Holiday Gift Guide 2011: High-Roller

Posted on Dec 19, 2011

The holidays are all about spending time with your friends and family while indulging in the finer things in life. And if you really want to indulge, we’ve found five truly remarkable and deluxe spirits to enjoy (or dream about).

New York’s famed Park Avenue Liquor Shop is the exclusive seller of this unique 20-year-old Appleton Rum. (There are just 180 bottles available.) It’s especially interesting because it’s the first single-cask offering the distillery has ever released in its more than 250-year history.

Harlen Davis Wheatley is practically a celebrity among bourbon connoisseurs, since he’s the master distiller at Buffalo Trace. But for ten years, he has been quietly working on a different type of alcohol: vodka. CLIX was distilled 159 times and comes in a handsome decanter and burl-wood box.

Glenmorangie has won acclaim for its single malt Scotches matured in a range of woods. The brand’s latest, Pride 1981, spent 18 years in American white oak and was finished for 10 years in Sauternes barriques from the renowned Chateau d’Yquem winery.

The base of this very special bottling of Grand Marnier is a blend of more than 20 cognacs that date back up to 100 years. The orange essence was distilled twice and then the ingredients were married in small French-oak casks for a year.

Travel through time with just a few sips of Taylor Fladgate Scion. The tawny port was made from grapes grown in 1855 and aged for 155 years in an oak barrel. It’s a rare chance to taste a fortified wine from before the phylloxera epidemic, which destroyed vines across Europe in the late 19th century.